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October 8, 2004/Tishri 23 5765, Vol. 57, No. 6
Free-spirited voters
Newcomers transform the political climate
GABRIELLE BIRKNER
The Jewish Week
A large front porch wraps around the house of state Attorney General Terry Goddard on a palm tree-lined street in central Phoenix, where more than 50 John Kerry supporters gathered on a recent Monday afternoon.
With the mercury nearing 100 degrees, the group drank lemonade and ate watermelon while discussing the Democratic presidential candidate's stance on issues including Social Security, abortion rights and the war in Iraq.
Among those at the informal rally, dubbed a "Front Porch Event," was Carl Woog, a Phoenix native and Conservative Jew who said he is intent on "turning Arizona kachol," Hebrew for "blue." It's the color that came to symbolize the states whose electoral votes went to Al Gore during the 2000 election.
As a Boston University student, Woog was a campaign volunteer during Kerry's 2002 Senate run. After graduating, he moved back to his hometown to pitch in for the Massachusetts lawmaker in his White House bid, first as a volunteer and now as deputy field director helping to oversee Arizona's 12,000 Kerry-Edwards volunteers.
Woog likes to joke that he's from a mixed marriage.
"My parents are both Jewish, but my mother is a Democrat and my father's a Republican," Woog said. "It certainly makes for interesting Shabbos dinner conversation."
Arizona, home to the late Republican Sen. Barry Goldwater, until recently was viewed as a bastion of Conservative politics. These days the state and its 10 electoral votes are up for grabs, with Kerry and President George W. Bush clamoring for votes here.
In 1996, Bill Clinton became the first Democrat since Harry Truman in 1948 to carry the state. Four years later, Vice President Al Gore lost by 6 percentage points, though his campaign invested minimal time and money in Arizona.
Observers say an onslaught of newcomers from Democratic havens such as New York and California, among them thousands of Jews, in addition to the state's large left-leaning Hispanic population who tend to vote Democratic, have turned Arizona into a battleground state, albeit one where the Bush camp is gaining momentum. (The state's electorate is about 40 percent Republican, 35 percent Democratic and 24 percent Independent, according to The Arizona Republic.)
A Sept. 14 American Research Group poll showed that among 600 likely Arizona voters, Bush would garner 49 percent to 43 percent for Kerry, with a 4 percent margin of error. Six percent were undecided. Other recent polls have shown Bush with a wider, and growing, lead.
But the West - or at least this Western state - is far from won for the president. With a month to go, the Bush and Kerry camps are still courting voters.
Arizona is now home to about 100,000 Jews, con-centrated in Phoenix and Tucson, according to Risa Mallin, executive director of the Arizona Jewish Historical Society. There are smaller but growing Jewish enclaves in the northern cities of Flagstaff and Sedona, she said.
Much like Las Vegas, Arizona has seen its Jewish population surge during the past 20 years, a demographic trend Mallin attributes to the city's warm climate, relaxed lifestyle, thriving economy, lower cost of living and a growing number of Jewish institutions like the Valley's new Jewish community high school.
The number of Jews, and resources to serve them, may be on the rise. But Barbara Helfgot, 56, a Democrat and Conservative Jew who moved from Southern California to Scottsdale two years ago, said kosher butcher shops and restaurants are less ac-cessible in Arizona cities than in Los Angeles or her hometown of Chicago.
"Out here it's more inconvenience than un-availability," she said. "My friend on Long Island jokes that I should get triple mitzvah points" for seeking out kosher cuisine in Arizona.
"In Arizona it's a slower pace of life," said Leonard Dinnerstein, 70, the Bronx-bred professor emeritus of American history, with a specialty in Jewish American history, at the University of Arizona in Tucson, and the author of "Anti-Semitism in America."
"The Jews I knew back in New York, everybody had a cause. The people I know here are basically involved in their lives," he said. "They like to hike and play tennis. Life is easier - you're not squeezing yourself into a crowded subway car - and I'd say people here are not as intellectually alert."
Arizona's Jewish electorate also looks different from back East, he said.
"In New York, I didn't know any Jewish Republicans," said Dinnerstein, who surmises that about 20 percent of Jews in Arizona vote Republican.
Irving Shuman, 80, Arizona chairman of the American Israel Public Affairs Com-mittee and a Bush supporter, said the state picked up two congressional seats in the 2000 census, "and part of that growth has been Jewish people."
Shuman said that while the majority of American Jews tend to identify as Democrats, Jewish voters in Western states are more likely to be swing voters than their counterparts in other regions.
"It's the Wild West, and people are more free-spirited," said Shuman, a Phoenix-based commercial property manager. "We're more apt to make a decision based on free thinking, not just what our parents told us."
Kirk Kroloff, 74, of Paradise Valley, for example, is a lifelong Republican who plans to vote for Kerry in November. "People here cross party lines on a regular basis," said Kroloff, a third-generation Arizonan and a Reform Jew. "Out West, you're raised to look at people, not at their labels."
Kroloff opposes the Bush administration's decision to go to war in Iraq, its ties to the Saudi royal family and its tax cuts for wealthy citizens.
"I admire Bush's record on Israel, but I imagine Kerry will be just as strong," said Kroloff, who purchased two "John Kerry for President" bumper stickers at the Front Porch Event.
Former Tucson Mayor George Miller and his wife, Roslyn, said Kerry would develop the types of relationships that could advance the Middle East peace process, which they said stagnated under Bush.
"Helping the poor, protecting women's rights, respecting the environment, seeing that there's a good educational system, not a punitive one - this is tikkun olam (saving the world), which is a big part of Jewish thinking," said Roslyn, a Reform Jew and a delegate to the Democratic National Convention in Boston.
Added George, "If you look at Jewish history in this country or in any other country, it's under a liberal society that Jews thrive the most."
While some Jews have called Bush one of the most pro-Israel presidents in history, the couple said the administration's Middle East policy - Bush's unwilling-ness to rein in Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and his decision to invade Iraq - will make it impossible for the United States to be seen as an even-handed broker in any future peace settlement.
But Bush supporter Yona Weitzner, who moved to Phoenix from Netanya, Israel, 27 years ago, said the president's policy in the Middle East is evidence of his respect for Israel's autonomy.
"As an American Jew and an Israeli, I always look at who is best for us," said Weitzner, a Hebrew teacher at The King David School, a Jewish day school in Scottsdale. "Bush has proven himself. He said he would take care of Saddam Hussein and Iraq, and he did. ... He also lets Ariel Sharon do what he needs to do."
According to Rabbi Yossie Shemtov of Chabad Lub-avitch of Tucson, Arizona's Orthodox community will vote overwhelmingly for Bush. "It's his traditional values, and it's also that he's a believer in an almighty God," said Shemtov, a Bush supporter.
"Some people are still uncomfortable with his (alliance with the Christian right). Some people have an attitude that Jews are the only ones who can believe in God, and anyone else who does is scary. I definitely don't believe Bush has an evangelical agenda."
Neither does Steve Gaynor, 49, a Phoenix-based entre-preneur and a member of the Republican Jewish Coalition. He predicts that in this polarizing election, more voters than ever - Jews and non-Jews - will break party ranks. Gaynor said some of his Jewish friends who are ardent Democrats support Bush based on what they see as the president's strong record on Israel.
"Bush has recognized, in a way a Democrat never has, that Israel doesn't have a partner for peace, whereas Yasser Arafat practically made a second home in the White House with Clinton," Gaynor said. "I would think that a significant number of Jewish people will look at their situation, look at the situation of the country, and not just knee-jerk vote because of the party.
"If you look at traditional Jewish values," he added, "they are parallel to Republican values."
Some observers say a vote for Bush in November might be the tipping point in weakening the American Jewish community's long-standing alliance with the Democratic Party.
Marc Spitzer, a Republican and elected chairman of the Arizona Corporation Com-mission, said that while the Jewish population still votes overwhelmingly Democratic, in Jewish circles it is slowly becoming more acceptable to be a Republican.
A former four-term state senator, Spitzer said that while campaigning he noticed a generational disconnect. "When I was knocking on doors, people in their 50s and 60s tended to be Democrats, but among their kids in their 20s and 30s, there were many more Republicans," he said.
"My mom, who affiliates with Truman and FDR, always thought it was a shonde, a shame, to be a Jewish Republican. But things are changing," Spitzer said. "You no longer have this hide-bound (Democratic) tradition, especially in the Western states."
Gabrielle Birkner is a staff writer for The Jewish Week in New York, where this article first appeared, as part of a series of firsthand reports from battleground states with sizeable Jewish populations. The final of three presidential debates will be held Oct. 13 at Arizona State University in Tempe.
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